Special Program Root Tag

The NASD issued an investor alert on Monday, warning investors about various types of global marketplace risks. Called “Market Risk: What You Don’t Know Can Hurt You,” the alert recommends ways investors can avoid risks. For instance, investors can diversify holdings throughout several regions and hold funds or securities both in the short- and long-term.

The Securities and Exchange Commission plans to revisit the independent chairman rule, along with mutual fund fees, particularly 12b-1 fees, and disclosure, The Wall Street Journal reports, citing remarks by SEC Chairman Christopher Cox before the Mutual Fund Directors Forum.

Edward Jones is proposing paying investors $127.5 million in vouchers to settle class-action lawsuits that it accepted revenue from mutual fund companies in exchange for recommending their funds, St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports.

With the stratospheric salaries that hedge fund managers are earning these days, there may be more to mutual fund managers' interest in employing hedge fund strategies than performance. Sure, they claim they're turning to riskier tactics to deliver better returns and distinguish themselves from the competition. In fact, many experts believe that mutual funds' use of hedge fund strategies is a growing trend and that the lines between institutional and retail investment strategies will blur.

The Central Bank of Bahrain has established new regulations for collective investment undertakings (CIU), which cover hedge funds, derivatives and other alternative investments, along with mutual funds, lawandtax-news.com reports. The bank will issue the new regulations later this month. They will require hedge funds to register.

Ron Speaker, who was with Janus for two decades and has run the $757 million Janus Flexible Bond Fund since 1992, is leaving the firm in June, Rocky Mountain News reports. At that point, Gibson Smith and Darrell Watters will co-manage the fund.

As the number of companies restating their financials increases—affecting not only their own management but also mutual fund companies and investors—businesses have begun to call on the Securities and Exchange Commission to make dramatic changes to the Sarbanes-Oxley accounting rules, Business Week reports.

Mutual fund companies are increasingly looking around the world for areas to growth through mergers and acquisitions, The Wall Street Journal reports.

As part of a $200 million expansion into Texas that will eventually employ 1,535 additional employees, Fidelity Investments recently signed a 10-year lease for 160,000 square feet in Lewisville, Texas outside of Dallas to support as many as 1,000 employees, bizjournals.com reports.

Two former Prudential Investment Management execs have sued the firm in federal court for forcing them out after they complained that Prudential changed the investment objective for a number of municipal bond funds they managed without notifying the board or asking shareholders for their approval, the Newark Star-Ledger reports. The two are Robert Waas, a former managing director, and Robert Germano, a former senior portfolio manager.

NEW YORK—The “Ancient Regime” is over, and fund companies can anticipate fewer lawsuits from shareholders over what they claim are excessive fees, according to panelists at the Practising Law Institute’s Investment Management Institute 2007 here last Friday.

Because managers of mutual funds and corporate executives who attended the same university frequently run in the same social circles or maintain their friendships well past graduation, the corporate executives tend to share key information about their firms with the portfolio managers, a new study found.

BOSTON-Retirement isn't always Adirondack chairs and seaside views, even for employees who do participate in company-sponsored defined contribution plans. Not even auto enrollment at 6% with a full company match can solve the retirement crisis.

The question may not be how independent mutual fund boards should be, but whether investors would be better off without fund boards altogether.

Mutual fund analysts may have set their hopes too high for the first quarter of 2007, as company earnings didn't reach the levels they had hoped, experts said during Lipper's first quarter fund performance review and outlook webcast last week.

With the stratospheric salaries that hedge fund managers are earning these days, there may be more to mutual fund managers' interest in employing hedge fund strategies than performance. Sure, they claim they're turning to riskier tactics to deliver better returns and distinguish themselves from the competition. In fact, many experts believe that mutual funds' use of hedge fund strategies is a growing trend and that the lines between institutional and retail investment strategies will blur.

Petko to Head Fund Sales For Transamerica Capital

Despite the warnings and the realization that many Americans know they need to save for retirement, 34% of workers are not doing anything about it, according to the 17th annual "Retirement Confidence Survey" by the Employee Benefit Research Institute of Washington.

The Mutual Fund Store of Overland Park, Kan., the fast-growing independent fee-based financial planning franchised business, is taking a page from successful tax office franchisor H&R Block's playbook-literally.

SEC May Require Funds to Disclose Fees in Dollars